The Unwritten Rule

by Elizabeth Scott

  She was with Ryan, and they were with Greg. Brianna said: “Sarah, over here, with its lighter voice than usual, happy, and then I stopped, smiled and stayed there. Ryan’s shoulder right next to mine

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  Brianna while Greg looked, talked and talked and said, “Sarah, what do you think? His voice was charming. I blinked and then said, “Insane” because that’s what Brianna always wanted to say when it sounded like that, and I saw the curve of her smile turning to Greg before swinging back to Ryan. Then linked her arm with Ryan, the gait of a couple, and waved for Greg and me, we both stood there, confused in our own ways. Ryan had to move to let Brianna took his arm and pretended I did not feel the tremor that ran through me when his arm brushed mine. I just moved, and when I did, Ryan’s eyes met mine and he remembered what I saw on Friday night as well. I saw that I was thinking the same thing as me. I saw that I was thinking about that kiss. He had seen the warm light in the eyes of the boys so many times but never to me. Never. “They seem happy,” said Greg. I looked. There was a fading bruise in the shape of mouth in his neck, just the slightest trace of a kiss. Brianna was watching. “Almost two months” I said. “I wish you still were Sunday he said, and took leave of me with his hand, then walked down the hall. It was then I knew he had seen Brianna when he left, and when he came to me after school and whispered: “We spent Friday looking, right? “I looked at him and said:” Did you see Greg again? “Not like you think,” he said. I had to leave the house because my mom was, well, you know. “It would be nice if you lost ten pounds, or would have better hair skin all. ? Then I drove around for a while and would not do my homework and knew you’d be busy with that, and Ryan is always doing things like art and never do anything fun, just-talk ?, and Greg was in his front yard, washing your car, so we went and got something to eat, she threw me out. But it was only a hamburger, and to lead, then it’s not like we’re, you know, doing nothing.

  She waved to Ryan, who had walked toward us, hands thrust deep into the pockets of his jeans. Brianna playfully took one and wrapped it around his waist. “You’re so quiet today. “It is quieter than normal, Sarah?

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  I shrugged, smiling at Brianna and not looking at Ryan. I smiled and did not look when she turned to him for a kiss. I smiled when I heard their lips meet. Brianna smiled when he said goodbye, pretty boy, and then took my hand, ready to throw me to his car and then to my house where we studied and ate dinner, and Brianna said his mother had called back to his lawyer and why his father still had not called. Brianna did not cry but her voice became very quiet, I hugged her and told her he was sorry. What I meant by what their parents were doing, he did. But also about how I felt when Ryan had said “Goodbye, Sarah, when Brianna and I left school. I had turned to face him, surprised, and he was watching me as I had done before. As he had said he was sorry and he did, but was sorry for his mother, father, and how happy I was when I had watched Ryan as he did. And then there was today and had avoided Brianna and Ryan. I went to the bathroom when I’m not usually this way would not see, I stayed locked in a box reading the graffiti. All were a fox or had an illness or death and no one should never write anything nice for the bathroom walls. Not even anything hopeful. It was as if we were all so busy trying to be happy or saying they were happy, but underneath there was nothing but bitterness, the kind that could only be released in ink, in words unspoken. Brianna cornered me after the last period, her hair in a beautifully casual disorder. His hands were cold, even desperate, grasping mine. “You come with me tonight,” he said. Swear that you will, Sarah. Swear “and said,” Okay, “thinking about his mother waiting with sharp words or his father promised something and Brianna and knowing that would never happen, and as needed there to hold me, to help them navigate the waters of two people it was assumed that they loved.

  But then we went down the hall to Ryan and said, “Sorry I could not speak last night, but meet me tonight. Although Sarah

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  has to come too, right? His mother is fully expecting to hear about the Cooking Contest and you need a break from that and I have to be a good friend, right? Ryan looked at her and said, “Yes, of course, and I thought no, no, no, no, no. I did not want to see it. I did not want to be home. In the car I told Brianna that I could not go. “You have to,” he said. I can not. - Why not? “Because I can. - Why? I sighed, wrapping my hands around my belt and looking for the right words. “Because that would be weird, right? “I said. I mean, you’re dating him. You want to be with him, and if you’re nervous about … “I’m not nervous,” said Brianna, her voice sharp, then wrinkled his face and blinked hard as he always did his mother talking to her. “I have to keep loving it,” he said finally. I do not want to be like my parents, okay? Do not want to leave when things are not going exactly as I want them. Understand that, right? “Yes, I understand, and Brianna, you’re not your parents. I said you’re not, because that Brianna, Brianna scared, was one that had never been around a guy, only had seen with his parents, and wanted to fix things for her. I did not want to see that look in his eyes confused. He loved her enough to lie to myself and think that going to the home of Ryan would be easy for me. That would be nothing. Brianna’s car is not there when I got home, and I parked in his driveway. I drive down the street and all the surrounding streets in the car of my mother, clutching the steering wheel because it is much more than anything. I drive around until I see Brianna’s car, and then under the street, pretending that we are both coming at the same time.

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  - Why do you come down that road? She says when we are walking toward the front door. I shrug my shoulders and she says. I was expecting a little you had come here before me. To see what kind of humor is. “And there, what? Informártelo “when you arrive and then leave? “No, you had stayed and been with us,” he says, grinning at me. Not as boring as you think you are, you know. “Oh, I say, and Ryan opened the door.

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  TRANSLATED BY: ANDRE_G CORRECTED BY: cYeLy DiviNNa

  to had been at Ryan’s house. Years ago, I came to a birthday party. I remember his mother served a cake from the supermarket, those whose icing is so sweet that almost bitter aftertaste in your mouth. I love that kind of cake, probably because Mom did not even dream of bringing home one of those. “Hey you-Brianna tells him, and wraps his arms on his shoulders, drawing him toward her. “Hello,” said Ryan, giving him a kiss on the forehead, and I see that Brianna is stressed a bit, I note that tilts the head up, put on tiptoe and pressed her lips firmly against his. I look away, do not want to see them kissing but not entitled to feel angry, sad and sick, no compelling reason, in any case, but I do not. I watch and see Brianna kissing lips Ryan ROSAR as short answer to kiss her, before they depart and say: “Come, come. - See? Brianna says when we entered, leaning toward me and whispered, clutching her hand on my arm urgently. What was that?

  - A kiss? “I whisper back, but I know that’s not the kind of kiss that receives Brianna, and she also knows, he says,” That was not a kiss. The next time we go out, I have to find someone to kiss you at least with him and we can discuss this properly for you … well, you have to know what I mean.

  Y

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  The little voice of guilt in my head says: I know. I know what it feels like a real kiss. I know what it feels like a kiss from Ryan. “Maybe it’s because I’m here, I say, and the minute they leave the words I feel the blood rushing to my face because I did not say it that way, not that he was not really kissing me. Except t
hat if it was what he meant. What I wanted to go. “No, him and kissed me in front of you before,” says Brianna smiling at Ryan, who is heading up the stairs and has turned to look at us, making a gesture to follow him. Only been the last couple of weeks that he has been … “she lets me, is turned towards Ryan and says,” I began studying, making it sound sexy and fun and all the ways to study not is unless you’re a guy and be with Brianna. I do not want to see. I do not see them, ? studying together. However, here I am. I continue slowly down the stairs. Ryan’s room is a typical room of a boy. Only how they look because Brianna has told me, and it is that I am familiar with the clothes always lying on the floor and curtains are usually closed. Ryan does all that plus a variety of dishes crusted bits of food scattered everywhere, but in a corner everything is fixed, precise meaning, and I see where you draw, drawing logs of various sizes stacked order, pieces of paper with sketches on a sheet, finger and one eye closed curve fixed in a memo board. I turn away to go at them, hoping to open the drawing logs. Brianna Wishing you want to open them. But instead, she is opening the curtains and looks out the windows of Ryan, calling him to stand by his side, pointing to a car that is going on and asked what she thinks of him. “I do not know,” says Ryan, and Brianna says: C’mon, it’s nice. Is not it beautiful? Can not you just agree with me? I do not want a new car, “says Ryan, and there is something final in his voice.

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  I look at Brianna, who is looking at Ryan as if he had never seen and do not know what to do. It is the startled look that gives parents, but a confused. And almost angry. “Just say it was nice,” she says, her voice going soft and wounded, confused. Did I upset? “No,” said Ryan, looking uncomfortable. Not that. It’s just that … “Well,” says Brianna, and sits on his bed, leaning back a bit, his shirt aside to show the long line of her throat and skin underneath. I think we’d better start studying, right? His voice is still smooth but now is warm, inviting, and I move nervous about the books I’m loading, sliding my fingers around its edges. I want him to sit next to her and I feel happy about it, but do not want to sit next to her, I want to shrug their shoulders and turn to me, see me looking at his drawings and cross the room to me and … - Sarah? Brianna says, with a little edge in his voice, and I shake my head and I say: Yeah, sorry, and I give him a chemistry book, sitting in what appears to be the most clean soil. I think soon I will be sent to get a snack or something to that Brianna would have that alone time you want. “You can not look down there,” says Ryan sitting down on the bed, looking as if he had done something foolish. “Oh, but you two …” There’s room up here, “he says, and pats the bed. “Yes,” says Brianna, “tons of space and no room he has a big bed … but she sounds and looks pleased. I doubt it, and she says, “Come on, smiling his smile Brianna, the smile of all-is-good. His fake smile. I move, and then there are all in bed, and I intend to be studying and I’m pretty sure Brianna is not studying. I see it moving, turning to Ryan, trying to catch his eye. I do not know if Ryan or not studying. I did not think before I sat in bed, so I’m sitting right next to him and I have to keep making me remember not to look, even sideways, but never mind.

  I am so aware of how close it is, the way his shoulder hit the mine when you move in bed, and the right side of my body, the side that is closer to him, this drumming, my heart beating

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  Through it, the pressure of blood pounding in my singing just for him so near me. “This is boring,” says Brianna, and I look at it, I address your eyes to the clock, where he spent half an hour. It seems like a long time and yet no time, and I do not want things to change. And while I am also desperate for change. It’s like two people. “So what did you do on Sunday? “Ryan tells me, and I look at Brianna, who is now perfectly still, frozen. -Study with Brianna, “I say, and the thing with lying is that it is not difficult. Easy to say, and look of relief on Brianna’s roster is one that I know. I’m there for her, I am your friend, that’s how things have always been the person who fixes things for her, especially when it comes to kids. “Sure,” Ryan said smiling and then Brianna, and I think what she said. Where he was actually on Sunday. Who was. And I could say what had really happened, to tell the truth, but I would not be doing it for Ryan. I would be doing for me and that would hurt Brianna, the angry much, and the thing that scares me is that a part of me still wants to know and talk. A part of me does not care that he was betraying. A part of me says that she has already given back to Ryan. But then would not it also has given back? And I’m someone who has gone. I know there are bigger things in the world to me, this, that people are hungry and dying and living lives that make mine look as if it were perfect, and I should not be so small. So tiny. I wish I want so much to Ryan, but I do. I do not know how to stop and remind myself that there is a whole world outside the room in which we do not help me. Do not make me a better person, I do not stop thinking about Ryan’s shoulder touching mine and thousands of things as I want but I know that if this were to happen, would in the end of my safe little world.

  “The truth is that I went to her house because she was upset at Tommy. You know, at the party, “says Brianna, and that is not appropriate

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  to say but she does not know. She does not listen to Ryan and me talking about it. “Well, I was really upset,” I say. Brianna just wanted to talk to guys and stuff. “Do not worry, I know you will meet someone,” says Brianna, Ryan and shoots a small smile, a smile look what-do-to-animate it, and I’ve seen it before. I always am the one who does not have an appointment, the person that the kids come up and say “So, your friend, you know, are you seeing anyone? ? And may not be the only girl in this one, but sometimes feels that way. Many times. Normally I would not mind. I know that when this old, twenty or twenty-seven, meet someone, but now I feel this fit of rage because Brianna so desperate to see me when I only liked two guys, and they both have chosen her. But when I look at Brianna, something inside me says - so quietly, as if afraid to hear it - what did they do? Does she have chosen? -Call to speak with you, Sarah, I remember, and I see that Brianna’s hand in his arm during the first party. I see her smiling, a smile that I know well. I’ve seen her dazzle to other guys. - Sarah? “Listen, and Brianna placed a hand on my leg, patting my knee. “Hey” I say, and she rolls her eyes but he smiles and says, “You and your habit of mind to stay. I stared at her, I see how it stands up and walks to the bathroom Ryan, opened the tap, and emerges with one of those little cups. She drinks it and then turns around, then throws it back into the darkness of the bathroom, but I hear it hits something, the thud of it landing in the trash basket. She knows the bath Ryan, knows him, and I’m seeing things that are not. Brianna Greg chose to kiss, he did, but Ryan chose to leave that late summer holiday with her. He chose to sit with her. Close your eyes when she comes over to kiss him. Return the kiss.

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  Here there is no evil villain, any friend who is really an enemy and this behind me. Brianna is on what you want, but I’ve never taken something that is mine. Never had to. Everything came willingly, and she has not done anything but be my friend. “Hey, I just thought of something, say when you sit, tapping my knee with his fingers. - Remember that I have some conditioner that is supposed to be great for the limp, lifeless hair okay? I bought it for you and right now I remember. She looks at Ryan. - Do not you think that would help the hair of Sarah? “I think she looks good,” says Ryan, Brianna and I again look at me and rolls her eyes. “Boys,” she says. If you do not go around babeándote about yourself, you look good. I’ll get some potatoes or something. Okay? -Turns back to Ryan. I know where you keep all your mother and I need a break from the chemistry and good wi
ll … it will be as it should have been the other night. Poor Brianna, her mother is always tormenting her, and I nod to show he is a good idea. I want her to be able to replace it when his mother ruined. I want to be right, and Brianna smiles. And then he’s gone and I am left alone with Ryan.